354 Extracts Srom the Port-folio of a Man of Letters. [Nav. 15 
which are called the Patrimony of Saint 
Peter. 
. Constantine, the fourth Byzantine 
emperor of that name, was he who be- 
stowed the sacred territory on pope 
‘Zechariah. This ricco patre, as the poet 
fitly calls him, subsidized Pepin of France, 
with the wealth of the church, to recon- 
quer from Astolfo, king of the Lombards, 
the exarchate of Ravennah, the March 
of Ancona, and other provinces which 
had been usurped from the Greek empe- 
yor. For thus rescuing the heart of Italy 
out of thé hands of the barbarians, Con- 
stantine LV. ceded to the popes of Rome 
the expedient jurisdiction and indepen- 
dence; and allowed them to nominate 
ie patrician,or civil governor, of Rome. 
ut this Constantine was no convert to’ 
christianity. He was born a christian. 
His nick-name. Copronymus (which it is 
not ‘more easy to translate delicately, 
than the name.of a color once called 
among our neighbours caca du dauphin ) 
originated in his suilying, when an imfant, 
the baptismal font during the initiatory 
rite, an accident, which put out of fashion 
the hitherto catholic practice of baptism 
by iiminersion. 
Petrarch and Ariosto both repeat 
Dante’s story; but it is surprising that 
Miltob, instead of correcting them by 
his learning, should have lent circujation 
to their error. 
RED SILMOUETTES. 
The antients, as Pliny tells us, filled 
up their silhouettes with a red color. 
* Cinnabari. veteres, que etiam nunc 
vocant monochromata, pingebant.” This 
practice came from the east, and is allu- 
dedeto in Ezekiel xxiii, 14. “ She saw 
meén pourtrayed upon the wall, the images 
of the Chaldeans pourtrayed with ver- 
million.” The vasescalled Etrurian, which 
are adorned with red. monochromatic 
figures, have been traced to a Greek, and 
might probably be traced to an oriental, 
origin. 
FORKS. 
Tn the ruins of Povtpeii spoons have 
been discovered, but no forks; whence 
it is inferred that the Romans, at least 
before the accession of ‘Titus, which was 
cozval with the suffocation of that city, 
had -no such table-utensils. Nor is it 
known that at any later period the an- 
tient world ever adopted. these instru- 
ments. Peter: Damianus tells us (De 
Institut. Mon. c. 11) that in the year 
999, Giovanni, a son of Orso, the then 
doge of Venice, married at Copstan- 
tinople, and brought home a lady of 
exemplary luxury. After describing the 
superstitious delicacy of ber habits, he 
adds; ‘* Cibos quoque suos manibus non 
tangebat, sed ab eunuchis ejus alimenta 
quaque minutius concidebantur in frusta 5 
que mox ilia quibusdam fuscinulis aureis 
atque bidentibus ori suo liguriens adhi- 
bebat.” Hence it appears that two-tined 
forks to eat with were yet a novelty in 
Italy in the year 1000. This lady who 
first displayed them at her table was 
named Maria, and was sister to the Ro- - 
manus, who acceded to the Byzantine 
empire in 1084, ‘Forks, then, are from 
Constantinople, and were probably in- 
vented there. fe 
A TOLERANT PRINCE. 
Ammianus Marcellinus gives this cha- 
racter of the emperor Valentinian, 
“Inter rehgionum diversitates medius 
stetit; nec quenquam iiquietavit; neque 
ut hoc colereturimperavit, aut illud: nec 
interdictis minacibus subjectertm cervi- 
cem ad id, quod ipse coluit, inclinabat; 
sed intemeratas reliquit has partes ut 
reperit.”. Yet with all this sovereign 
equity, he was a staunch catholic, aid 
professed that religion, under Julian, with 
some risk and loss of advancement. 
SALT-CELLAR. 
A salt-cellar, says Dr. Johnson, is so 
called from salt and cellar: in this case 
it ought not to mean a vessel of salt set 
on ike table, but rather a cell under- 
ground where salt is stored. Probably 
the French sa/iére is the real reot of the 
latter half of the word, in which case the 
word salt is a superfluous part of the 
compound, We have many such tauto- 
logous combinations which give both the 
Enelish and French name. Such are 
but-end, robin-red breast, wine-vinegar, 
Why has it been esteemed unlucky to 
overturn a salt-cellar? This superstition 
derives from pagan Rome; where the 
salt-dish was a holy platter, in which the 
fiystlinus of the feast were offered to the 
gods, and which was usually ornamented 
with the figure of some divinity. “ Sacras 
facitis mensas salinorum appositu, et 
simulacris deorum.” And again Livy: 
“ Uc salinum patellamque deorum causa 
habeant.” And Horace: “ Paternum 
splendet mens& tenui salinum.” ~And 
Statius: ‘ Exigno placuerunt farre sali- 
na.” To overturn altars and images of 
the gods, was naturally held ominous. 
GAUDENTIO DI Lucca. 
That Mandeville wrote the History of 
the Sevarambians, is less certain than 
that Bishop Berkeley wrote the Travels 
of Gaudentio di Lucca, This learned 
romance 
